43 Facts About Tim Groser

Tim Groser held the offices of Minister of Trade, Minister of Conservation, and Minister for Climate Change in the Fifth National Government.

Previously, Tim Groser was a diplomat with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade and served as New Zealand's ambassador to the World Trade Organization from 2002 to 2005 and ambassador to Indonesia from 1994 to 1997.

Tim Groser resigned from Parliament on 19 December 2015 to take up the role of New Zealand's ambassador to the United States of America, which he held from January 2016 until August 2018, when he retired.

Tim Groser was born in Perth, Scotland and came to New Zealand with his parents Antony and Joanna Tim Groser, who were professional actors, in 1958.

Tim Groser attended Hutt Valley High School and completed his education at Victoria University of Wellington, where he was a left-wing student activist and president of the university's socialist society.

Tim Groser graduated with a degree in economic history and began, but abandoned, a PhD in economics ahead of the birth of his first child.

For more than thirty years, Tim Groser was a public servant and diplomat.

Tim Groser started as a junior economist with the Treasury before joining the Ministry of Foreign Affairs where he was a negotiator on the Closer Economic Relations free trade agreement between Australia and New Zealand.

The success of this round on New Zealand's export economy led to Tim Groser being nicknamed "the billion-dollar man" for the associated one per cent rise in New Zealand's gross domestic product.

Tim Groser subsequently became New Zealand's ambassador to Indonesia from 1994 to 1997.

Tim Groser left the ministry at the end of 1999 to be executive director of the Asia 2000 Foundation, a post The Dominion described as "increasingly seen as a career springboard for diplomats".

Between 2002 and 2005, Tim Groser returned to Geneva on appointment as New Zealand's Ambassador to the World Trade Organization.

Tim Groser served as the chair of the WTO's rules committee from 2002 and chair of its agricultural negotiations committee from 2004.

Tim Groser was heavily involved in the early years of the Doha round of discussions, which are still ongoing "on paper".

Prime minister Helen Clark called for Tim Groser to be removed from his WTO chairs, which were separate to his ambassadorship.

Tim Groser resigned his ambassadorship in May 2005 but continued as WTO agriculture chair until the government officially removed its support of him after the conclusion of agriculture meetings in July.

In 2005, Tim Groser opted to leave the public service and run for Parliament, stating that being a member of Parliament had been a job he had coveted for thirty years.

Tim Groser was selected to stand as a list-only candidate for the National Party in the 2005 election and placed 13th on the list, the highest newcomer.

Columnist Fran O'Sullivan wrote that the Labour Party's prime minister and trade minister were upset because they had mistakenly believed Tim Groser to have been a supporter of their own party.

Tim Groser said he had supported National since he was 21 and that he was encouraged to stand for election by both a senior minister from another country's government and by National Party president Judy Kirk.

New Zealand Herald reporter Audrey Young claimed Tim Groser was recruited specifically to be trade minister in a Don Brash-led National government.

In personal votes, Tim Groser opposed raising the age for purchasing alcohol from 18 to 20 in 2006, saying he did not think an age-change would solve alcohol issues in New Zealand, but changed his position to support that proposal when it reemerged in 2012.

Tim Groser opposed, like all National MPs, the introduction of a medical cannabis regime in 2009 but voted in support of legalising same-sex marriage in 2013.

Tim Groser accompanied Labour Party trade minister Jim Sutton on a trade delegation to Hong Kong soon after the election and Sutton's successor, Phil Goff, on a delegation to the United States in 2006.

Tim Groser sat on the foreign affairs, defence and trade committee from 2005 until 2008.

Fellow National list MP Christopher Finlayson would later write in his memoir that Groser was worried he would one day win the seat; Groser lost each election by an average of 4,590 votes but was re-elected each time as a list MP.

Tim Groser left Parliament on 19 December 2015 without delivering a valedictory statement.

Tim Groser was appointed Minister of Trade, Minister of Conservation, Associate Minister of Foreign Affairs and Minister Responsible for International Climate Change Negotiations in November 2008.

Tim Groser relinquished the conservation portfolio in January 2010, citing workload issues and amid criticisms that he was disinterested in the portfolio, and succeeded Nick Smith as Minister for Climate Change Issues in 2012.

Tim Groser held his post as trade minister until his retirement from Parliament in December 2015.

Tim Groser made international headlines in late 2012 when he said that the New Zealand Government would not sign up for the second commitment period of the Kyoto Protocol.

Tim Groser said the 15-year-old agreement was outdated, and that New Zealand was "ahead of the curve" in looking for a replacement that would include developing nations.

Tim Groser attended the 2012 United Nations Climate Change Conference in Doha and 2015 United Nations Climate Change Conference in Paris, where New Zealand undertook further climate change commitments, including the Paris Agreement.

Tim Groser's bid was eventually unsuccessful and the Brazilian diplomat Roberto Azevedo was elected as the Director-General of the WTO in May 2013.

On 22 March 2015, The Intercept news website claimed that New Zealand's signals intelligence agency, the Government Communications Security Bureau, had spied on other WTO directorship contenders on behalf of Tim Groser using the XKeyscore mass surveillance system.

In July 2015, Tim Groser said he believed reasonable people were being "whipped up into a frenzy" over issues like pharmaceutical costs and investor-state dispute settlement by people who, for ideological reasons, opposed the agreement.

In interviews given after his ministerial career, Groser said that the TPP was the achievement he was most proud of during his time as trade minister.

Tim Groser took up his post as ambassador in early 2016.

Tim Groser was succeeded as trade minister by former diplomat Todd McClay and as climate change minister by Paula Bennett.

Tim Groser resigned from Parliament on 19 December 2015 to take up the role of New Zealand's ambassador to the United States of America.

Foreign affairs minister Winston Peters denied that Tim Groser had been recalled, stating that Tim Groser had not sought an extension to his three-year term as ambassador.

Back in New Zealand, Tim Groser established a trade consultancy firm in 2019.

Tim Groser converted to Islam to marry Milda Emza, an Indonesian Muslim and his second wife, in 1996, during his tenure as ambassador to Indonesia.